‘We’re Spending More Than Ever and It Doesn’t Work’

William Beach / January 14, 2009

“We have tried spending money. We are spending more than we have ever spent before and it does not work.”

Sound like, oh, Rep. John Boehner of Ohio or some other exasperated Republican stalwart lamenting proposals to spend our way out of the recession?

Listen again:

“I want to see this country prosperous. I want to see people get a job. I want to see people get enough to eat. We have never made good on our promises.”

Sound more like a liberal Democrat pushing job creation — say, Harlem’s Rep. Charlie Rangel?

What about this:

“I say after eight years of this Administration we have just as much unemployment as when we started. … And an enormous debt to boot!”

Surely this must be House Speaker Nancy Pelosi or another leading Democrat denouncing President Bush’s economic policies.

Wrong. Wrong. And wrong again.

The words are those of none other than Henry Morgenthau Jr. — close friend, lunch companion, loyal secretary of the Treasury to President Franklin D. Roosevelt — and key architect of FDR’s New Deal. (more…)